MTV's Gandhi 'insult' outrages Indian MPs

Nearly 150 Indian MPs and political activists pledged yesterday to fast all day in protest at an MTV show and an article in a Californian magazine that allegedly insulted Mahatma Gandhi.

The MTV show, Clone High, USA, has not been screened in India, but a newspaper report about it has upset many Indians who revere Gandhi as an advocate of non-violence and India's independence leader.

Clone High, USA introduces a character called G-Man, a fictitious clone of Gandhi, who wears dangly earrings, eats junk food and is the ultimate party animal.

Although the clone Gandhi character is portrayed as wild-living, MTV's website refers respectfully to the real Gandhi as India's "national and spiritual leader whose non-violent disobedience forced Great Britain to grant India independence". The chief minister of Haryana state, Om Prakash Chautala, urged the government yesterday to use diplomatic channels to prevent a repeat of such TV shows and magazine articles.

Mr Chautala, an ally of the prime minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, said he was consulting legal experts and would soon send notices to the American magazine and MTV asking them to explain why their material mocked Gandhi.

A report on Wednesday in the Indian Express newspaper said a Californian magazine had published an article in its latest issue depicting a muscleman beating up an image of Gandhi.

"Gandhi is so great that such pygmies who try to ridicule him will fail," the paper quoted Nirmala Deshpande, a follower of Gandhi, as saying.

Gandhi's grandson, Tushar Gandhi, had also urged Mr Vajpayee to act, it said.AP.